A Mother’s Day reflection

It’s Mother’s Day. Florists, bakeries and restaurants are seeing a brisk business day for certain.

Today is the day mothers are celebrated, pampered and loved for all the tantrums they have to put up with, all the tears they dry and all the scolding they dish out.

My own relationship with my mother is complicated – as much as I love her, I am also constantly frustrated with her.

You see, my mother is like an onion. No, not that she makes me cry (which she does), but like Shrek says, “Onions have layers. Ogres have layers”. My mother definitely has layers.

Trying to understand the complexities of her and her life may be easier now, but as a teenager, it was difficult.

Though I may never know what it feels like to be a mother, I know very well the influence mothers have on their children.

So how did having my particular mother as my mum affect me? Let’s count the ways:

My name

Having the name that I have is quite confusing to Malaysians. My first name is considered as a Muslim/Malay name where else my last name is as Indian/Tamil as it gets.

This I have to give it to my mother, for following some odd family custom of giving children Urdu names.

Thank you mum for giving me a name that either leaves people confused or straight out asking me, “What are you?”

My rotundity

I’m round. My brother is round. My mother is round. ‘Nuff said.

My devastating good looks

My mother is beautiful. People say I look exactly like her. Therefore I must be beautiful too. Can’t argue with logic.

My independence

It was my mother who once told me that I am just like her – independent. She left home after her secondary education, joined a hospital and worked as a medical assistant for seven years before going back to school to get a double degree in teaching and English. She followed her own path, and not surprisingly, so did I.

So yes, thank you Amma for this “in your face, convention” spirit.

My (self-deprecating) humour

If there is one thing my mother excels at is laughing at herself. She does not take herself too seriously and neither does she shy away from making a joke or two.

She taught me how to look at the bright side, how to find humour in daily life and how to be aware enough to laugh at yourself.

My warped sense of optimism

I am a paranoid pessimist to the core, but my mother? Nah, she thinks everything will turn out for the better; that if you put your will and energy towards something, it will happen. She is what one would call a fighter – she does not know when to give up.

When I look at her, seeing all that she has gone through in life and still being full of laughter, love and joy, my cold pessimistic heart that is normally on paranoid hyper drive gets a little hopeful.

I start to think about endless possibilities and start fighting. But that feeling of optimism scares me because I am not my mother. Go figure.

In many ways, I am the person I am today because of my mother. Some characteristics and traits I inherited from her, some I picked up and some I avoid like the plague.

Every time Mother’s Day rolls around, I am reminded of something my mother told me a long time ago when I bothered to get her a trifle for Mother’s Day.

“What’s the point of this when you behave the way you do every other day?” That was the last I did anything for Mother’s Day up until a few years ago.

Those words stung then, but today, they serve as a reminder that I need to check myself in the way I treat my mother.

Like I said, my relationship with my mother, it is complicated. Just as much as I like hanging out with her, she also easily agitates me.

I guess that is what family is. Plus, there is that remaining baggage from my younger days, when our relationship was wrought.

But despite all this, I do know one thing – I love my mother and she loves me. – May 10, 2015.

* This is the personal opinion of the writer or publication and does not necessarily represent the views of The Malaysian Insider.